Time Turner
by T.Wright Seirols
Summary: When Albus looks back, it is Him that he sees.  It has always been Him, closer than a father, but distant.  Distant, but dominating, and it is Him that fills his life like a shadow, forever present but ever out of reach.
1. Year 5 & 8

_I decided to write this fanfiction to commemorate the ending of the Harry Potter movies. Part II of the film is publicly released today in Canada. Thank you, J., for these magical adventures that have become a part of my childhood._

**DISCLAIMER: The Harry Potter series belong to J.K. Rowling**

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><p><em>11 years ago<em>

"Daddy, Daddy! You promised! You promised!" A wail stretches through the thin walls and into the open street, shrill and piercing.

"Now, now, daddy has some things to take care of,"

"But you promised, you said you always keep your promises," A boy stands on the kitchen tiles, right beside the fireplace. Tear tracks run down cheeks puffy from baby fat and red rimmed eyes glare accusingly at Him.

He doesn't give in, He never does, and Albus knows that; just like how He never buys more than one bag of Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans, just like how He always does what He promised.

Until now.

It is cold in the kitchen, and his feet hurt from standing barefoot on the smooth-bumpy porcelain. Porcelain, like the blue-black inked vases that sat on the fireplace. _They're from a far, far, away place_, his mother said, and stopped.

Albus knows they came from a place called China. He told him that. Albus likes the 'ch', a curl of the tongue followed by a burst of air from the teeth, and the brusque-soft 'na'. A pretty name, like the lady with the chocolate-covered-almond eyes and rosy-pink smile that came to give the vases.

What did He called her?

Something with that lovely-exotic 'ch', two of them.

Albus stood at the door with his mother, her grip tightening at irregular intervals.

Albus looks up at his mother now. She is tall and pretty, very pretty.

He always says that.

She is holding his sister, someone with a name like the first two bars of the music box his sort-of Uncle Dudley had given him for Christmas.

Lily.

Lily is very small, and she waved her pink-puffy fists at him the first time he peeked into her crib, standing on a chair.

Albus liked her right away.

Beside him, his brother swats at his hand warningly. Albus stares at his eyes, curved like two-third crescents of the moon. James isn't like Lily, where she is all pinks and edges; he is all browns and waves. He curled too, from the cowlicks on the top of his head to the toes that scrape his nails against the kitchen tiles.

He kneels down in front of him, shoulder to shoulder, eye-to-eye, green to green. Albus sees his own eyes in His. They're just a bit lighter, His eyes, bright like the not-too-young leaves on the oak tree in the backyard.

"Your eyes have a wholesome colour," his aunt Hermione had said to Albus. Albus doesn't know what 'wholesome' means when it's not written on Uncle Dudley's cereal boxes, but he wishes he had eyes like His.

Uncle Ron had once told him that he looked like a copy of Him. But Albus knows that isn't true, it's the little things that are different, the little things that are off.

"I have work to do, Albus. We'll make up for it, okay?" He's close, and Albus sees the bird-feet around the corners of His eyes and the grey pencil lines in his hair.

"Daddy will be back soon, let him go, alright?" His mother tugs on his hand, her skin cool and dry. It's an urgent sort of tug, the pad of her thumb pressing into his knuckles.

Albus tries to shake his head, but nods anyway. Not because He is right, but because it is Him. Him and his mother.

He kisses Albus on the forehead, then James, then Lily. He doesn't give his mother a kiss, but smiles at her instead. She leans forward and kisses Him on the cheek.

He smiles again and turns around, His black coat swirling with the dancing green sparks in the fireplace before vanishing with Him.

In the kitchen, Lily starts to cry.

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><p><em>8 years ago<em>

"I didn't do it!" Albus screams, his boy-shrill voice echoing.

"Well, it wasn't me!" James calls back, just as loudly, with flushing cheeks.

"Boys, boys, boys, what are you doing?"

Albus sees his mother rushing out of the kitchen, her fire hair streaming behind her in tendrils. She pushes them apart firmly, one hand on each shoulder, one higher than the other. Her Quidditch-hardened joints locked against soft-coarse fabric.

Albus tries to squirm out of her hold, but his mother is strong and layered with supple muscle. James sticks out his tongue at him, pink with Grandmum Molly's mulberry juice.

"It was you!" Albus screams again and lashes out at him, his blunt nails clawing at his brother's hair-mop.

For a moment he enjoys the look of sheer shock on James's face, the sort of respect that only seven year olds can understand, until his mother raps him on the wrist, hard.

"Albus! Is that any way to treat your brother?"

"James did it! I'm telling you! He broke that mirror!"

His mother signed, letting the breath out through her teeth the way she did before a lecture.

"I don't care who or what broke the mirror, but I want both of you to show a little maturity and try to solve the problem instead of arguing about it! Albus, go upstairs and think about what you did. James, come to the kitchen, I need to have a talk with you. We need to have this cleaned up before your father comes home."

Albus feels the heat rushing to his face and the sourness in his nose. He squints hard so that the liquid hotness welling up in his eyes do not spill onto his cheeks. He turns around and rushes up the stairs, but it is too late, and he swipes a hand at his eyes, blinking hard into the limp-stiff cloth so that James wouldn't see his face through the railing gaps.

When He comes home, it's all Albus could do not to burst into tears. He would have liked to run into His arms, but he didn't, not because James was watching nor because his mother was retelling the day's horrific events. But because he is Albus, and he hasn't done anything wrong, and so does not need the privilege that He offered as consolation. He would have offered regardless, Albus knows, but he doesn't move and stands rooted to the line-dot plank floor, watching Him listening to his mother as she stirs the pot of soup on the stove.

His mother sighs, "I guess they're still little, but they should try to get along better."

He nods, "Yes, well, this is rather different from how I imagined things would be between the two of them, as brothers. This isn't the first time, is it? I'm worried."

"Perhaps if we just wait it out, it'll pass. I remember that Ron and Charlie went through this phase."

He smoothes His hair back, the black-bristles sticking up in the many different directions that only His hair could. Albus ruffles his own locks, but they don't jut out in the same way.

"Maybe we should get someone to take a look at them, a special Healer or something." He has not noticed him, neither Him nor his mother, and Albus sees James in his mind, riding a broom with Him as he stands behind the window-curtains watching.

"It's not so serious to that extent, I mean, they are young, and it's just squabbling."

He purses His lips, "But if it is something serious, and we ignore it, it could ruin our family."

Albus feels the temperature drop, the kind that makes him shiver during summer.

"So this is what it's about? Is it your image of a perfect family again?"

"Ginny, you know I don't mean that, or maybe I do. But regardless, I just want them to grow up in a good environment. Pleasant, quiet, safe."

His mother's voice rises a few decibels, "But you're not thinking of them, you aren't. You're thinking of yourself and trying to fulfill your own illusion of a family that you're trying to have because..."

She spots him then, and Albus is glad.

"Have you been there for a while, Albus?"

And he lies for the first time in his life, even though He once said that He valued truth, "I just came."

He kneels down, like He always does when He is talking to him, "Come here, Albus."

So he goes, and up close, he sees the paper-creases on His forehead and cheeks.

"Try and get along with James, alright?"

He sees his mother opening her mouth from the corner of his eye and he nods. He smiles and Albus smiles too, even if only to match Him.

During dinner, Albus dips his roll in the dish of butter just like James.

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><p>Reviews are appreciated. :)<p> 


	2. Year 10 & Year 11

**DISCLAIMER: Harry Potter is the property of J. K. Rowling**

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><p><em>6 years ago<em>

Albus does not particularly like flying, but he doesn't particularly dislike it either. He enjoys the wind whispering through his hair when he flies in lazy circles under an autumn sky, drifting downwards along the paths of the yellow-orange leaves, the red-leaves carpet fluttering beneath his feet. He likes the crisp air that breaks against his forehead and the steady-slow scent of leaf-rot that drifts on the breeze.

But it isn't autumn, it's summer, and summer means flying of a different sort. Summer means seemingly jet propelled brooms zooming through the air, flying high enough to become specks in the sky, and launching toward the ground in a blur, pulling from the dive in the last possible second, all while accompanied by equally frenzied balls.

Summer means Quidditch, and Quidditch means watching James soaring over the roof laughing with Him by his side from the shade of the gnarled tree-oak.

Albus never joins them, in summer-flying that is. It's too fast, too shocking, too surprising. It startles him the way a loud noise startles him in the early morning, when he is almost awake but not quite, jarring his nerves and leaving him tingling with diluted fear.

He doesn't feel that rush of adrenaline, that sense of freedom that so many of his relatives, including Him, claimed to feel slashing through the air. To Albus, summer-flying is out of place, it's too brief and abrupt and rushed; too easy to gain, too easy to lose.

It has no place, not in his world.

Not in his world where time moves languidly, where not even the tiniest movement of paper-translucent insect wings goes unnoticed. His world, made up of trappings of moment-snapshots, unchanging glimpses of outside.

Unchanging, the full white fluffs of the dandelion at exactly that time in the summer, the precise lime-green of the sycamore leaves on that day, the almost spherical dew drop hanging on that grass-blade, warping the tip in that particular way.

Small things, but it's always the small things that don't change.

People are not small things.

People change, like the way the lines-groves accumulate annually on His face, like the way He summer-flies higher every year with James, higher and faster, like the way He is in the Quidditch-backyard with James more and more.

Like James, who is leaving for Hogwarts when summer ends. James, who laughs with Him the way Albus has never been, nor will ever be, able to. James, who is bold and daring and rash, James, who is as unafraid as He always is, James, who captures His attention, James, who Albus is afraid will bring that attention with him when he goes and leave Albus with none.

James, who would never cry as Albus does that night after summer-flying with his cousins.

James, who would never have Him knocking on his bedroom door.

"Albus, are you alright?"

Albus doesn't answer because He comes in anyway.

He comes in without a light, and kneels down beside the bed. Albus turns around so that He would not see the tears glistening on his cheeks, not that He can in the dark.

"Tell me what's wrong, Albus."

There are a lot of things he wanted to tell Him, things that James would never tell if he were Albus. So Albus tries to do what James would do.

"Why haven't you ever taught me how to play Quidditch?"

But He knows what he is really asking.

"Well, I wasn't under the impression that you liked Quidditch very much, was I wrong?"

Albus shakes his head begrudgingly, "Not really."

"Then I don't understand why I should force you to learn something that you have no interest in."

"But James..."

"You are not James, Albus, and James is not you. For one thing, James doesn't employ the services of our library nearly as much as you do."

Albus laughs at that through his tears; James would never be caught dead reading.

"And for another thing, Albus," something in His tone makes Albus turn around. In the dim lighting, he can just make out His eyes, clear and green behind the glass pieces.

"You are more like me than James is."

Albus stares, and He smiles, brushing his hair from his forehead.

"I want you to know, that no matter how different you are from James and Lily, I love all three of you the same. I would never think any less of you."

Albus neither believes nor disbelieves Him, because his own truth is different from His, and he isn't very good at making up his mind.

But even so, in the morning, amidst the smoke and the clunking metal, Albus stands on the platform, waving at James.

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><p><em>5 years ago<em>

"Albus, what on earth are you doing here at the owlry at this time of the night?"

"I could ask you the same, Rose." Albus smiles and dips his quill in ink without looking up. He would recognize his cousin's scratch-smooth voice anywhere.

Rose plops herself down beside him unceremoniously, her black robes spilling over the step-stair gaps. "You're writing to Uncle Harry."

"Nicely observed." Albus loops the tops of his 'p's carefully, dabbing at the swirl as to not drip too much ink. The ink smudges anyway, and Albus pauses for a moment to look at the tiny ink-feet tracing the parchment fibres.

"I'm going to write to Dad, he'll probably sleep better once he finds out I'm in Gryffindor." Rose makes a face, the really boring kind with her tongue sticking out. Albus can do better.

And he feels pride for a second because of what Rose said, a sense of I-am-better-than-you that comes from being different. He would never ask that of him.

Rose doesn't say anything else, and Albus welcomes the sandpaper scratching of quill against parchment. It is a comforting sort-of silence, the warm sort that makes Albus think of leather books and writing desks, of coloured water-glass bottles and of Him flipping worn-out pages.

He has always read to Albus, every day since James left.

Every day until today.

And now, sitting under the same moonlight He must be sitting under, surrounded by sleeping owls, Albus feels an odd sort of hollowness. Not homesickness of course, he can't possibly miss home after one day.

It's more like nostalgia, the long fancy word that he learned from Rose last winter after James left again.

It's a funny word, nostalgia, all short-elongated.

Like His voice when he reads, undulating and smooth, comforting.

Comforting and safe, bringing characters that lingered behind Albus' eyelids.

Warm and soft, whispering like the pages of a book.

"Albus, hey, Albus, are you alright?"

Albus jumps, rocking from his cousin's hand shaking his shoulder. He blinks hard at the parchment on his lap, the blue ink-puddles spreading outwards.

"Yes, I'm quite alright, Rose." He is surprised at how thick his voice sounds as he dabs at the wet spots and smears his fingertips in blue.

"You sure? We can write tomorrow, you know, I can come with you then." She peers at him, leaning forward to catch his eyes.

His eyes that everyone says look so much like His, the two spots of always steady green that looks at him with confidence. Eyes that talk to him as clear as He would, watching him as he waved from the moving train that morning.

"I think I'll finish this tonight, no sense in dragging on the suspense about Sorting." Albus smiles a little and is glad when Rose mirrors him.

Somewhere behind them, one of the numerous owls hoots.

Albus would like to think that it's his owl; He once said that owls understand people surprisingly well.

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><p>Reviews are appreciated! Many thanks to my Beta reader!<p> 


	3. Year 12 I

**DISCLAIMER: Harry Potter is the property of J.K. Rowling.**

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><p><em>4 years ago<em>

"You know, Potter, even if you stare at me for a whole afternoon, my Potions essay will not Transfigure into yours in the morning."

"Thank you for worrying about me, but I have my own essay source."

"That wasn't what I meant, Potter."

"Do you like my last name? You seem to be saying it a lot."

"I wouldn't like your last name even if it could save my life."

"You seem very passionate. It's okay though, Dad says passion is important."

"Get on with it, Potter, what do you want?"

Albus tilts his head, considering.

"You are Scorpius Malfoy."

And so, Albus Potter speaks to Scorpius Malfoy for the first time one afternoon in the Hogwarts library.

The boy facing him sneers unpleasantly, "I should like to think that I know my own name, Potter. Tell me what you want or leave."

The first thing that Albus notices about Scorpius Malfoy is that he sneers, a lot. Albus has never particularly liked to smile with one side of his mouth, it feels strange and He never does it, but then again, perhaps Scorpius Malfoy finds convoluting his face enjoyable. Albus ponders for a moment on this rather unique feature of the boy in front of him, who by now has lifted his eyes off the parchment and is staring at him with one raised eyebrow.

Albus sees that he has awfully deep trench-lines on his forehead that are even more pronounced than His.

On second thought, looking at his eyes, the first thing that Albus notices about Scorpius Malfoy is how washed-out he is.

Everything about Scorpius Malfoy is pale, from his white hair that is too light to be called white-blond to his waxy skin to his eyes that would be referred to as silver in polite conversation if not for their striking resemblance to muggle tin-foil that Uncle Dudley wraps leftover cake in. It is as if all of the colour has been bleached out of the tips of his hair and toes, leaving behind a faded imprint of tints and shades.

He looks, muses Albus, as if he's been washed with soap one too many times.

"Five seconds, Potter, or I'm calling Pince."

Albus knows that's a lie. There is no one in Hogwarts, least of all crabby librarians, who would go out of their way to help Scorpius Malfoy, especially not from Albus Potter.

"I think that my staying here benefits both of us," Albus looks at Scorpius Malfoy's eyes, like the way He always does whenever He talks.

"Oh? Enlighten me then," and he gives another twitch-smile.

Albus tilts his head, considering his answer. He would have to be careful with Scorpius Malfoy and his sneers.

"I want to be left alone and you don't. It's perfect."

There is no response at first, and Albus is tempted to repeat himself. Perhaps Scorpius Malfoy hasn't heard him.

Then, to Albus' surprise, Scorpius Malfoy slides back his chair with a harsh squeak and bolts up, slamming his palm on the desk with controlled anger.

"And what makes you think that you, Potter, know what I want?" He pulls his face close, and Albus automatically leans back into his chair. Scorpius Malfoy is angry, and Albus can feel it from his clenched teeth and not-as-slicked-back hair.

Albus doesn't understand, because it's true that Scorpius Malfoy doesn't get much company and that Albus gets a little too much of it.

"This is a pointless conversation and I am fine with being left alone," Scorpius Malfoy turns away and walks towards the door in a swirl of robes that somehow look impressive with his twelve-year-old frame.

Albus can never do that.

And he blurts out the reason of his conversation, because he doesn't want him to go, because even if Scorpius Malfoy is unpleasant, he is similar.

And it's hard to find similar people.

"You are like your father."

It fascinates him, although Albus has only seen Draco Malfoy twice, once at King's Cross and once at Diagon Alley. It's uncanny how similar Scorpius Malfoy is to his father. Not simply in appearance, but in demeanour too. They walked the same way, sounded the same, and even looked at others the same way with a mixture of haughtiness and suspicion.

Albus doesn't particularly like the way Scorpius Malfoy does it, but he admits that Scorpius Malfoy is far more successful at it than he is. Albus can never act so much like Him, not in behaviour. Not like Him who was so outstanding within the same walls he is in, though perhaps not outstanding exactly, more like, attention grabbing.

Or rather, visible.

Yes, visible, that's it.

"_Conjunctivitis!"_

Albus barely registers the burst of pain that implodes in his eyes as Scorpius Malfoy whirls around with alarming speed with his wand pointed, casting a spell that a second-year shouldn't know.

Perhaps his spell-damaged vision is playing tricks, because through the blur and the pain, Scorpius Malfoy almost looks hurt.

Which is utterly ridiculous since Albus is the one who has been hexed with a spell that supposedly causes pink eye symptoms but really produces the impression that acid-needles are imbedded into one's eyes.

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><p>"And I find them like this! The library is a place of quiet and peace, Poppy, and these hooligans dare to..!"<p>

"Now, now, Irma, you're creating a disruption in the hospital wing, which is also a place of quiet and peace," Madam Pomfrey replies drily, dabbing some sort of cold-cool gel on Albus' eyes. Albus involuntarily squeezes his eyelids.

"Don't twitch, boy. I do wonder sometimes, if this attachment to the hospital wing runs in your family, Mr. Potter," finishing applying the ointment, Madam Pomfrey wipes her hands on her almost-thread-bare apron.

"I must say, Malfoy," the matron turns to the figure standing beside Pince, the librarian firmly gripping him by the neck of his robe, "that was an impressive spell you cast there. I've lifted the hex but it'll take at least an hour for the after-effects to vanish. I'd prefer that you stay here for the time being, Potter, so that I can keep an eye on you. You can never be too careful with eyes."

Albus blinks, squinting his eyes to adjust to the too-bright light of the infirmary. It is an order, not a question; there is no need for him to reply.

"Twenty-five points from Slytherin, I think," Pince gives the fabric in her hand a firm shake, "and detention for a week."

Scorpius Malfoy squirms in Pince's hold, twisting sideways and around, "Potter started it."

"I did not!" Albus shoots up. No matter how similar Scorpius Malfoy is, Albus won't forgive him for slander. He once said that blaming others is a characteristic of the cowardly, and He is the bravest person that Albus knows. Albus doesn't want Scorpius Malfoy to be cowardly; it's not a nice trait.

"Sit down, Potter!" Madam Pomfrey barks. Albus shrinks back, her voice grating the inside of his eyelids. "Now, Malfoy, care to explain how Potter started this even though he's the one that's been hexed?"

Albus watches Scorpius Malfoy's mouth open and close several times, giving him an uncanny resemblance to an out-of-water fish, a really pale, deep-ocean fish.

He stays like that for several seconds and then violently jerks his head towards the direction of the infirmary entrance, away from Albus, "I don't want to."

Albus sits down; there isn't anything to be done then. Scorpius Malfoy's tone has made that clear, short, final, and nothing like His.

Pince, however, must have missed the message, because her features have contorted into a mask of irritation, though not a mask precisely, since it doesn't do much in terms of hiding anything. "Impertinent boy," she crows, spitting the 'p', "answer when a question has been asked for your benefit!"

Scorpius Malfoy isn't listening, Albus can see. He seems to be occupied in trying to turn his head like an owl, away from Pince and Albus.

Madam Pomfrey smoothes her hair from her part and does that funny little thing with her eyebrows and nose that grown-ups do, a raise of eyebrows followed by a widening of eyes and a simultaneous flaring of nostrils.

Exasperation, Rose says it is.

Albus isn't sure what exasperation means, but if Rose says so then he won't contradict it. It's in this way that Rose reminds Albus of Him. They're both absolute to him, Rose because of her brains and Him because, well, Albus doesn't know. It's His compassion perhaps, the warmth that radiates off him that makes it impossible for Him to be argued against.

Scorpius Malfoy catches the grown-up look, and he tilts his head so that he is looking in the direction of Madam Pomfrey, Albus and Madam Promfrey. He's stopped moving and is staring straight ahead, not at the elderly woman but at Albus instead.

Albus shifts his chair ever so slightly, sideways, to avoid Scorpius Malfoy's gaze; it's uncomfortable. But it follows him, so Albus glances up at his eyes.

If Albus ever believed that eyes can speak, then he would have stopped believing it that instant when he sees Scorpius Malfoy's.

They are clear and blank, completely devoid of any emotion that books claim eyes can hold. Nothing stands out about them, they are just there. If it weren't for his expression of coiled-anger, Albus would never have felt that scared-discomfort that he is feeling.

Scorpius Malfoy doesn't have his wand, so he can't hurt him. Albus knows that, but he also knows, even if he doesn't really know, that every muscle of Scorpius Malfoy is taunt, that every fibre of him feels anger against Albus for no reason that Albus can make out.

Scorpius Malfoy is a coiled snake with carefully bred anger right before striking.

"Don't look at me like that, old hag."

Albus moves back because some primal part of his brain is screaming at him to, even though his logic tells him that it's a twelve-year-old standing in front of him with no means to attack.

"If Potter were standing in my shoes, there wouldn't even be this problem."

Albus sees His eyes, so bright and warm, always looking ahead. He would never shirk away like Albus if He were here.

"I can have privacy to my thoughts if I so wish."

He would not be scared to continue something He started. He would not be backing away from a situation He initiated like Albus is.

"I don't have to explain myself for every single thing that I do, if I say something then you should at least consider it."

Albus is sure that He would never be so afraid of someone so similar to Him. But maybe he is wrong, perhaps Scorpius Malfoy isn't as similar to him as he thinks.

"You'd take Potter at his word in a heartbeat."

The first time Albus saw Scorpius Malfoy, he was so sure that they were similar, scraps of boys beside towering fathers, one warm-cool and one dark-pale.

"Do you not trust me? Have I done anything dishonest, have I ever told any of you a lie these two years?"

When they first entered the Great Hall, no, even before that, people already knew them both, really knew them. Albus felt the warmth surrounding him and saw the coldness around Scorpius Malfoy.

"I've never broken a rule until now but you all look at me like I'm some problem."

Albus heard the whispers around Hogwarts, pleasant and unpleasant. Pleasant about him, not so pleasant about Scorpius Malfoy. But they were similar even then, because they were both apostrophe-d additions after their fathers, Harry Potter's son and Draco Malfoy's boy.

"It's because I'm a Malfoy, isn't it? None of you can get over the fact that I look like my father."

Albus saw the distance between Scorpius Malfoy and other people. It was an invisible cage. No one went out of their way to bother him, but neither did they go out of their way to approach him. Albus was in there with him, surrounded by admiration for Him, because even if people loved his father, Albus was not, and can never be, Him.

"So what if my surname is Malfoy? So what if I look like my father? "

Perhaps that's why Albus approached Scorpius Malfoy. They are children cast as extensions of their fathers' shadows and that is enough similarity for Albus.

"Just because my father was the way he was in school doesn't mean I will turn out like him! I'm not him in opinion or in personality. I'm not the Draco Malfoy you knew!"

One is not close enough; the other is not far away enough.

"I'm not 'Malfoy's son' or 'traitor's spawn'. I'm my own person and all of you should start to treat me like myself and not like Draco Malfoy!"

The infirmary turns needle-drop silent for a few breath-catching moments.

Then Madam Pomfrey takes out her handkerchief and wipes her forehead.

"Madam Pince, if you could take Mr. Potter and Mr. Malfoy to the Headmistress's Office."

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><p>Reviews are appreciated!<p> 


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